1. Field of the Invention
The present invention is related to methods for creating user virtual experiences and, in particular, to a method and system for allowing a user to be virtually present at any place on earth, and beyond.
2. Description of the Related Art
Over the past decade Internet has become an integral part of people everyday lives. Ability to use Internet affects people leisure activities and habits greatly. Modern travelers and vacationers lean more towards individual planning of their trips using Internet. Typically, people perform pre-travel initial information search using variety of on-line resources.
For example, TripAdvisor, a conventional online travel tool, can direct the virtual travelers to areas and places of interest and provide a limited number of photos and videos about these places. A TripAdvisor user, however, has absolutely no control of what photo/video information he can view beyond the pre-recorded video feeds provided on the web site.
Another popular tool is Google™ Streets and Maps products, which allows user to view close up pictures of most urban areas of the world. However, this web tool does not currently cover rural areas, as well as car/boat-inaccessible areas. Likewise, Google™ Streets and Maps product does not give a user any control of what and how the video data is being rendered to him.
Another useful and popular tool is webcams located at points of interest, such as beaches, resorts, ski areas etc. The webcams, typically, provide a user with a limited live (or recorded) view of the area, so the traveler can see current weather, water or snow conditions at the resort. The user once again has no control of what is being shown to him. A view angle and positioning of the web cams is controlled by the company owners and the user has no control over what he can actually see.
Therefore, while all of the above mentioned conventional solutions attempt to provide a user with a live video stream, they do not bring a true virtual experience to user at home, because the user has no control of video feeds being rendered to him on a computer screen. In other words, this type of viewing experience does not step too far away from a conventional TV viewing experience. Currently, the majority of existing video rendering systems, such as TV, WebCasts and radio stations provide limited visual and sound experience based on conventional principles of broadcasting.
Even though the video stream can provide a very wide view, it does not provide a sense of presence, because the user cannot control or interact with the system beyond simple commands “on” and “off.” In all conventional systems, a camera man commands and controls the video stream, essentially taking away any freedom of deciding where a user (i.e., a viewer) wants to be at the place of recording of the video stream. A true virtual viewing experience means ability for a user to interact with a video source. None of the existing video streaming systems provide that.
Thus, there is a strong demand for a new type of a low-cost, scalable, commercially available system for providing people with an ability to experience “presence” at any place on the globe and beyond. While many systems that render very interesting high quality video streams exists, none of these systems can claim that they provide a true real-time interactive “virtual presence” to their users and lend them some means for extending the reach of their eyes to remote locations any place on earth and in space and, essentially, let people's dreams come true.
Accordingly, there is a need in the art for a system and method for providing efficient and reliable hands-on interactive virtual experience to people using conventional personal (mobile) communication devices, such as PCs, laptops, iPADs, Smartphones, etc.